My Most Important Friend
by Ciircee
Summary: A story from Meiling's childhood in Hong Kong with Syaoran.


Disclaimer: CLAMP and their associates own everybody in this fic with the exception of Yi Min, who exists in some form, I'm sure.  I don't make a dime from telling the stories in my head.

Dedication: To Chelle-sama.  Thanks for the beta and for telling me where to get off ^.~  

Author's Note: Regarding episode 43.  Please, for the love of god, watch the subtitled episodes.  The dubs make me cringe.  Well, they do now…I shudder when I think about the fact that I used to not only watch, but enjoy, what they've done to Card Captor Sakura.  Title taken from the episode—the Chinese Company sub.  Mei-Ling and Xiao-Lang are, as always, the Cantonese pronunciations of Meiling and Syaoran.  

_My Most Important Friend_

"Mama, who's that?"  I point at the little boy behind Auntie's house.  It's my very, very, very first time in Auntie's house.  We used to live in Wuhan but now Daddy works at a different job for the Clan business and we live in Hong Kong.  It was scary coming to here from the mainland but my cousins are very nice.  Auntie's big girls put my hair into odangos for me.  Sort of; my hair isn't long enough yet, but it will be and then I'll wear it in odangos all the time just like the other girls here.  I'm having fun here.  But that little boy, he doesn't look like he's having any fun at all.  It's hot outside, much hotter than Wuhan was in summer, and he's holding a big stick and hitting at a funny post with stick-out parts.  My uncle Wei is moving the different parts around and one of the stick-out parts hits the boy in the shoulder and he falls down.  "Mama!"  I point again.  Mama is talking to Auntie.

"Goodness, Yelan!"  Mama finally looks out.  "That can't be your Xiao-Lang, can it?  He's so big!"  Mama giggles.  "And what a little warrior!"  I give Mama another look as the little boy gets hit again.  He keeps getting right back onto his feet and hitting at the post with that stick even though now he's got blood on his lip and a big scrape on his hand.

"It is, indeed, Yi Min.  He's grown very fast.  Wei is to begin training him in the ancient arts at the end of autumn."  Auntie sounds like she doesn't really care, but Mama said that she'd sound that way because she has powerful magic and spends a lot of time in meditation so she can be calm and use her powers.  Mama and I don't have magic, even though Mama is Auntie's sister; but Daddy says that only a very few people have magic and that Auntie's magic comes from _very far away in Mama's part of the Li Clan, from a magic man.  Daddy's part of the Clan doesn't have the magic man in it.  Uncle Wei and my Uncle who died are from another part of the magic man's family.  I don't understand it very well, but Mama said that's because it gets very complicated because the magic man's mama got disowned and her name was erased until the magic man came to China from English-land and tried to restore her name and the family chased him out of Hubei province.  Later, when they forgave his mama for marrying the English-land man, they couldn't find where she belonged in the Clan and so they guessed as good as they could.  I tip my head back to look better at Auntie, to see if I can see the magic man in her.  "He's ready now, but I wanted him to begin the physical training first, so that he knows how painful his choice will be.  Another few months and you'll be seeing sparks fly."  She sounds happy-sad._

"Already?  So the rumors are true, then.  We've a powerful sorcerer in the family again."  Mama murmurs.  Outside, Xiao-Lang is bleeding more.  "He's not very good with the staff, is he?"  I don't understand why Mama sounds like she thinks it's funny that Xiao-Lang keeps getting knocked down.  I don't know why Uncle Wei keeps hitting him or why he keeps getting up.  "I can't believe you're training him in it, you were horrible with it."

"We determined when he was born that the sword was what he was meant for."  Auntie tips her head to one side, watching her little boy.  "But I don't want him to take the sword or his training for an easy path."  Mama looks sharply at Auntie.  Auntie looks like she's not watching Xiao-Lang, she looks like she's watching something far away.  "He'll need to be as strong and as determined as he can be."

"Yelan?"  That's Mama's warning voice and if I were Auntie I'd have my hands crossed over my behind.  "You might outrank me in Clan position but I'm still your older sister."    

Auntie sighs, a soft sound.  A little bit sad sounding.  "I've given him the journals of Bo-An's son.  He'll have to have lessons, of course, to read them."  Auntie shrugs.  "I felt it was necessary."

Mama gasps and drops her tea cup all over the floor.  "You can't mean…Yelan; you can't mean to tell me that your son will be sent to find that man's _Cards."  Mama's face is all white and pinched looking.  'That man' is what we all call the magic man; Daddy says that we forgave his mama, sort of, but 'that man' caused a lot of trouble when he made new magic and then didn't share it with the Clan.  He took it to a place called Japan.  And so the Clan is still a little angry with him, even though he died a long time ago.  I told Daddy that if I was 'that man' and the Clan was mean to Mama, I wouldn't share with the Clan either.  Daddy laughed and told me that he probably wouldn't share also, but the Clan was different then._

Auntie is mopping up Mama's tea.  "Our family made a terrible mistake a long time ago.  The time is coming for it to be set to rights."  She looks hard at Mama and Mama is glaring back.  I look back at Xiao-Lang.  He's all dirty and he's got blood on his face and hands and pants and Uncle Wei is taking his stick away.  He's not done though, because now he has to hit the post with his hands and kick it with his feet.  He's better at this, but every now and again he still gets pushed over into the sand. 

"He doesn't seem very happy."  I whisper it, trying to catch Mama's eye as she goes to the kitchen to get a new cup.  Auntie hears me.  She looks out the window at where Xiao-Lang is getting up again.

"No.  He doesn't seem very happy."  She's very quiet and I feel one of her hands rest on the back of my neck for a moment.  "You must be bored, listening to your mother and me talking."  She says after a moment.  "Would you like to go play in Fanren's room?  She won't mind."  Outside Xiao-Lang gets knocked over again and when he gets up I see his face.  And then I know why he keeps getting up just to get knocked down again.  He's wearing a face that's like the one I wore for weeks and weeks before we left Wuhan and it's also has the same parts of the face I wear when I don't know how to put my hair so it's like the other girls or when I don't know what some words mean, because the Cantonese here is different from the Mandarin back home.   He's miserable and he wants to be like the big boys who were training when Mama and I got here.  He doesn't want to get teased and made fun of and picked on for being different. 

"Auntie?  Can I go out by Xiao-Lang?"  Auntie's fingers stroke for a second, stirring the little hairs that got left down and then she nods and shows me a special hidden door that will take me out to the place where Xiao-Lang is.  Xiao-Lang makes an angry face at me when I step onto the sand.  It gets even angrier when I set my feet and put one arm out in front of me and the other over my head, curling my fingers up like his.  He drops his arms and stands up straight and he scowls, dark and fierce.  I bite my lip, but I don't change how I'm standing.   

Uncle Wei comes over to me and kicks my feet closer together.  "Find your balance, little Mei-Ling."  Uncle Wei nods to Xiao-Lang.  "Watch your cousin, he's got his."  Xiao-Lang keeps scowling.  "Master Xiao-Lang…" He says and then he folds his hand on mine, making my fingers as stiff as I can get them.  When I look over I see that my cousin and I are mirrors of each other.  I grin at him, happy.  I want to poke him the way that Auntie's girls poked each other and say 'see, you don't have to be all alone'.   Uncle Wei makes us both try to stop the upper part of the post thing; he calls it a practice dummy.  Xiao-Lang stops it three times in a row before Uncle Wei makes him stop so I can have a turn.  I get knocked over right away.

"I'm gonna do better the next time!"  I tell him.  My arm and shoulder hurt a tiny bit and my butt hurts where I landed but it's not much and I don't feel it hardly at all when Xiao-Lang stops scowling.  He shakes his head at me and starts his next turn.  I watch him closely and by now, after so much practice, he's moving really slowly and on my fourth turn I manage to block one strike;  a fast one, too. 

We're maybe only halfway through Xiao-Lang's seventh turn when Mama comes out of the house.  She looks at Wei, kind of like she's angry and tells me it's time to go.   "So, say goodbye to Master Xiao-Lang.  I've already given your goodbyes to Mistress Yelan."  That's not Mama's angry voice, not quite, but there's something that Mama doesn't like. 

It's probably the fact that I'm all covered in sand and my hair is down in snarls by now; but I won't leave Xiao-Lang alone. "I'll be back for next time!" I do what Daddy says to do when you make a promise; I look Uncle Wei  and Xiao-Lang right in the eye so that they can know that I mean it.  "Then we can practice together.  We can practice together every time."

"Master Xiao-Lang has training every day, little Mei-Ling."  Wei has really soft eyes when he tells me.  For a minute I think maybe that's not such a good idea; I'm already sore. "I think maybe I'll say 'no' but then Xiao-Lang folds his arms and puts his chin out like he thinks maybe I can't do it.  Or like maybe he's just really afraid I won't.  

"Then I'll be here, every single day."


End file.
